The ex-deputy of the Saratov Regional Duma from United Russia, who was accused of using a fake document for firearms, was given a criminal fine of 40,000 rubles. This ruling was announced today, on January 25, by the justice of the peace of the court district No. 4 of the Kirovsky district. Alexander Solodovnikov.
The presiding judge found the former lawmaker guilty under Part 5 of Article 327 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation. According to the investigative committee, Kurikhin submitted a fake inspection report for the storage of firearms and bullets, which allowed him to renew his authorization for eight firearms.
The case was complex and involved checks on firearms storage at two locations: an apartment on Lermontov Street and a house in Ust-Kurdyum. The defense claimed that an inspection had been conducted, but the evidence suggested otherwise. The examination revealed that individuals other than those responsible had filled out the documents for the firearms check. Additionally, discrepancies were found in the documents themselves, such as the dimensions of the safes not matching the actual ones. Police inquiries revealed that no applications for firearms checks had been submitted. The prosecution argued that the verification procedures had not actually been carried out.
Before the hearing, the ex-deputy appeared confident, joked, and was in good spirits. However, his demeanor drastically changed when the verdict was announced. There was a moment when he rolled his eyes or approached a nearby wall and looked at something there. Perhaps Kurikhin believed he was untouchable until the end. But the court seemed to surprise him.
Additionally, the prosecutor’s office pointed out that Mr. Kurikhin used his deputy status for personal gain: he submitted requests to law enforcement agencies using the deputy request form for administrative and criminal cases in which he is involved. The parliament member claimed that he sent the appeals as a deputy because he believed he was under pressure due to his deputy activities.
Throughout the entire preliminary investigation and trial, the defendant did not confess and requested to be acquitted, also alleging biased treatment and illegal actions by law enforcement agencies.
The state prosecution requested Sergei Kurikhin to perform 480 hours of compulsory work. On December 15, 2020, Sergei Kurikhin was expelled from ER. The then leader of the “ER” faction in the regional Duma Ivan Dziuban explained that the party had decided to consider the question of expelling Kurikhin, relying on decision of the Frunzensky District Court dated November 11, 2020 on the termination of the criminal case and criminal prosecution against the journalist Sergei Vilkov, accused of slandering deputy Sergei Kurikhin. The subject of the proceedings was a publication on the social networks of a journalist, which dealt with the possible criminal past of the politician. Kurikhin did not wait to be expelled, and he wrote a statement about leaving the United Russia.
Last year, Kurikhin was deprived of his deputy mandate, after which journalists wrote about him departure for Europe. First Court of Cassation recognized as legal depriving Kurikhin of the deputy mandate of the regional Duma.
Kurikhin is the deputy editor-in-chief of the Vzglyad-info news agency. At the same time, he himself became a hero federal TV channel “Russia 24”. In November 2021 Sergey Kurikhin stayed more than three hours during interrogation in the economic security department of the Main Directorate of the Ministry of Internal Affairs for the Saratov Region.
Kurikhin’s civil wife suspected in tax evasion by 21.8 million rubles.
A case is also being investigated against a former member of the Public Chamber of the Saratov Region, Ksenia Kornilova, and entrepreneurs Vadim Baldin and Mikhail Panteleev. They are suspected of organizing the deliberate bankruptcy of Mikhail Panteleev.
According to the security forces, in 2018, unidentified employees of Sargrad JSC, owned by Sergey Kurikhin, and Ksenia Kornilova, head of Consulting-PRO LLC, produced fictitious documents confirming that the individual entrepreneur Mikhail Panteleev, whose accounting was handled by Consulting-Pro PRO”, debt under a loan agreement to Vadim Baldin in the amount of more than 60 million rubles. These actions, as the investigation believes, caused the inability of Mikhail Panteleev to satisfy the requirements of banks for 60 million rubles. Ksenia Kornilova worked as an assistant to Sergei Kurikhin in the regional Duma.
According to the official declaration, the income of deputy Sergei Kurikhin, who left United Russia, fell in 2020 and amounted to 5.3 million rubles. A year earlier, he declared 5.5 million rubles. He owned five land plots, two apartments, and shares in seven non-residential premises. In the declaration for last year, the deputy already indicated four minor children (a year earlier there were three), two of whom own shares in one apartment. The deputy assured that he had no wife.
In addition, the Supreme Court now consider the complaint Sergei Kurikhin’s mother, businesswoman Nadezhda Shilovskaya. She was the customer for the construction of a gallery on Oktyabrskaya Street on a land plot that previously belonged to the Fedin Museum. As a result, a restaurant was built instead of a gallery. At the end of November 2021, the regional government filed a lawsuit demanding that the restaurant be recognized as an illegal building and demolished. Saratov arbitration consolidated claims about the return of the land to the Fedin Museum and the demolition of the restaurant on it, and then decided to demolish the building, which upheld appellate and cassation instances.
Territorial Administration of the Federal Property Management Agency turned to the Arbitration Court of the Saratov Region with a claim for the recovery from illegal possession of several real estate objects related to the infamous Kashtan Gallery in the regional center (Vavilova, 6) from the state ownership. The Federal Property Management Agency considers it illegal for an individual entrepreneur Nadezhda Shilovskaya to own a part of the Chestnut building.
